Peace be with you.
Should we be having a fish fry on Good Friday? I get this question from people outside and inside the parish each year. Yes, we should and here’s why. First, I understand that it is one of two days, along with Ash Wednesday, of both abstaining from meat and fasting from food in general. But, fasting means we get to eat one regular-sized meal along with two smaller meals that don’t equal the large meal. The fish fry meal is our regular-sized reward after a full-day of smaller meals that don’t equal it. How could anything equal the best fish in town anyway, right?
A connecting aspect of both the Gospel we read at the beginning of Mass and the Passion that really struck me was that Jesus had made plans for both. He planned on where his disciples would get the donkey he would humbly ride into Jerusalem. Unlike an invading king on a mighty warhorse, Jesus would have looked rather pathetic riding in on a donkey. But that was part of the plan. He planned where he would inaugurate the Eucharist during the Last Supper. He arranged for his disciples to meet a man there with the code words beginning with “The teacher says…” He even warned the 12 apostles that they would abandon him, despite their protests. Amidst the chaos of his arrest, he indicates that it is a fulfillment of scripture.
This isn’t a scenario of a failed coup, a plan that started well that gets out of hand. He knew what he would say and not say all the way through. Jesus invited Pilate to faith when he asked him if he was the King of Jews. “You say so”, he says to this powerful individual. Please say it, please believe it, he seems to plead with him. His final words come from a Psalm that begins in utter frustration but ends with “And my soul shall live for him, my descendants serve him. They shall tell of the LORD to generations yet to come, declare his saving justice to peoples yet unborn: “These are the things the LORD has done.” We are some of those descendants. We need to be able to gather to serve the Lord and be part of the plan that Jesus has to bring about salvation, yes, even at a Good Friday fish fry…if we’re open to it.
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